Why do some bands suddenly disappear? Band disagreements, running out of steam or the lead singer going solo are often quite high on the list. The classic is “artistic differences”, which is a catch-all for “we hate each other now”.
Another frequent contender is a legal battle with the record label or management. The mystery of Space’s long-lost third album seems to fall close to this.
Let’s go back to December 1998 to set the scene. If you were watching television at the time, chances are you’d have seen an advert for the latest Honda Accord model.
In the background, you’d have also enjoyed listening to Space’s gloriously spooky version of ‘We Gotta Get Out Of This Place’, originally a hit for The Animals in 1965. This was featured on a double-disc single release called ‘The Bad Days EP’, which paired the cover with two remixes of songs from their top-5 album ‘Tin Planet’, and two new songs. It hit a peak of number 20 on the UK charts, a strong performance for the 4th single from the album. It was their 8th top 40 single in two-and-a-half years, and it seemed at this point they were just going from strength to strength.
Fans of the band, myself included, were eagerly awaiting their next move. Midway through the next year, they were featured on another iconic cover of a classic song when they appeared on the popular Tom Jones album Reload with a duet of The Kinks’ ‘Sunny Afternoon’. The album was released by Gut Records, which was home to both Jones and Space at the time. It was the perfect stop-gap before they came back properly with their 3rd album.
Only, the album never appeared. The commercially-minded and pretty infectious song ‘Diary of a Wimp’ stalled in the charts at number 49 when it was released in July 2000. The public were shifting their focus away from the indie darlings of the 90s and were seemingly buying music by newer artists – Coldplay debuted the same week with their breakthrough hit ‘Yellow’, and other acts like Blink-182, Eminem and David Gray featured more prominently on that week’s chart.
England had flopped out of the Euro 2000 tournament the week before, and there was a subdued mood across the nation. Am I blaming the lack of support for the happy-go-lucky track on Phil Neville? Well… even I would admit that’s a bit far fetched. Perhaps it suffered from a lack of radio play and promotion at the time. That’s a huge shame for one of Space’s most accessible songs.
The song was due to be released on what would have been their third album, ‘Love You More Than Football’. But the album never saw the light of day, despite being fully recorded, mixed and ready to go, replete with album artwork.
According to their comprehensive anthology from 2019, the album was “enmired in legal hassles after the lowly chart placing of its lead-off single… (which) resulted in Murphy quitting the band… and a slow decline in their fortunes.”
As a result, fans of the band only had the five songs that featured on the single (the title track plus b-sides ‘Hell of a Girl’, ‘Why Can’t We Turn On The Lights’, ‘If I Ever’ and ‘Raymond’) to guess what the album sounded like.
In 2002 the track ‘Gravity’ was also made available via a Greatest Hits compilation, further frustrating fans by showing what was clearly the sound of a band that had created something quite special in the studio. The song is acoustic led, with a beautiful orchestral backing arrangement serving as a counterpoint for Tommy Scott’s yearning vocals.
It wasn’t until 2019 that a fully remixed and mastered version of the album would see an official release, via the aforementioned anthology release. Firstly, I would say that the name of the album and cover artwork does not scream vibes of a band that wanted to be taken seriously. But the music held within the album should be.
The title track itself is a lovely bit of pop music, and there are more nuggets to be found within. ‘Voices’ sees the band at their melodic best, with the refrain “If you ask me once again I’ll swear to God, I’ll kill you then I’ll ask you questions when you’re gone” proving that any message can sound beautiful if sung the right way.
Space have always been a band that knew how to have fun and play around with different sounds. The sinister track ‘Evil Things’ is broken up with a weird cinematic dialogue which finishes with a man shouting “But you’re still not having fun!”, and as the chorus kicks back in we can hear the sound of mysterious keyboard noises knocking around to disarm us. It absolutely works in a way only Space can really pull off.
The overall vibe is that of lost love, and revenge and emotional turmoil are also prominent themes. It all comes together with the song ‘Despise’ – a catchy hook, cinematic spookiness, lost and forlorn loner lyrics. It’s typical of the early Space sound, and one I wish I’d heard 25 years ago. Still, hearing it now isn’t exactly a bad thing either!
If you were a fan of their first two albums and have somehow come across this article, I can’t recommend this album enough. It’s now available on all major streaming services and deserves to be heard, even if it’s late for its own party.
Cinema, etc. 